Al Alvarez
Al Alvarez
Alfred Alvarezis an English poet, novelist, essayist and critic who publishes under the name A. Alvarez and Al Alvarez...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth5 August 1929
above attacked british nervous poet preference
I had attacked the British poets' nervous preference for gentility above all else.
nervous poet british
In [The New Poetry] I had attacked the British poets' nervous preference for gentility above all else, and their avoidance of the uncomfortable, destructive truths both of the inner life and of the present time.
english-poet players
The fact that we write about it doesn't mean we play better than ordinary players at all.
english-poet ways
I could think of worse ways of going than at the poker table.
english-poet mistakes money point sitting
But in a tournament, you can be said in for all your money at any point so you can't make any mistakes so you have to, it's all about where you're sitting at the table.
ego english-poet
I think one of the interesting things about poker is that once you let your ego in, you're done for.
book books-and-reading boy dreadful english-poet imagine jewish loathe mean nice
I mean to say, this is the book and I really loathe it and I can't imagine what a nice Jewish boy like me ever, how I ever got into this dreadful trade.
couple curious later matter miss pages perfect quite repeated sentence work
Because one of the curious things about writing is that it doesn't matter how perfect you try and get it, that you never quite get the sentence right, or there are things that you miss and, you know, you have work repeated a couple of pages later that shouldn't have been repeated.
finish fold game hand poker
It's going to finish when I fold my hand and go up to the big poker game in the sky.
suicide moving heart
When neither high purpose nor the categorical imperatives of religion will do, the only argument against suicide is life itself. You pause and attend: the heart beats in your chest; outside, the trees are thick with new leaves, a swallow dips over them, the light moves, people are going about their business.
drama divorce habit
Divorce transforms habit into drama.
games gambling casinos
The point is that it looks like gambling because the language of the game is money.
art artist vulnerable
The better the artist, the more vulnerable he seems to be.
art may coherence
Twentieth-century art may start with nothing, but it flourishes by virtue of its belief in itself, in the possibility of control over what seems essentially uncontrollable, in the coherence of the inchoate, and in its ability to create its own values.